


The Day Magic Died

by Quillfiend



Series: Omega Squad: The Navori Code [2]
Category: League of Legends
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Omega Squad - Freeform, Zombies
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-09
Updated: 2019-04-09
Packaged: 2020-01-07 14:18:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18412373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Quillfiend/pseuds/Quillfiend
Summary: Back in the Badlands, Rumble has a special task for Veigar, and unpleasant pieces of the past are revealed on the job.





	The Day Magic Died

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this chapter but ended up unhappy with how it turned out, so I'm just slowly rewriting the entire thing...

„ _Without air, there would be no fire. Every combustion has two essential components: something to act as fuel, and an oxidizing agent...“_

_Veigar felt as if he had been repeating the same lecture for the hundreth time. It angered him; his genius was better spent on grand projects, advanced feats of science, not wasted on explaining the basics of chemistry to the freshmen of Piltover University. He turned away from the blackboard to deliver a condescending sneer to his ignorant audience, but there were no students in the classroom, no confused eyes and gaping mouths. A single girl was sitting in the frontmost row, quietly listening to her tutor. Veigar breathed a bothered sigh through his nostrils and let go of his frustrations. He couldn't be angry with her._

„ _I've a question,“ she raised her hand, „if two people burn for each other, who's the fuel - and who's the oxidant?“_

„ _You tell me.“ Veigar sat behind his writing table and ran his claws through his dark fur, slicking his long ears back. Lulu pushed herself up from her chair and climbed over her desk to join Veigar. When she stood behind him he tilted his head backwards in hopes of receiving a smooch, but she just smiled at him, her fingers crawling down his shoulders._

„ _I guess I'm a single disillusioned propane molecule,“ he said when she gave him no answer, instead pressing her hands into him in a massage, „trying to react with something that doesn't exist.“_

„ _And here we go again,“ she nuzzled into the fur between his ears, „would you be happier if I disappeared entirely? That way you wouldn't be confused about the whole thing.“_

„ _No!“_

_His answer was so vehement that he almost fell off his chair, especially after Lulu stopped supporting it from behind. She walked around him and straddled his lap, and he gave her an apologetic stare._

„ _What if I told you I was made of magic?“_

„ _I wish,“ he lifted his clawed hand to caress her cheek, „if only there was any magic left in the world.“_

„ _You just have to believe,“ she smiled, „like I do in you and me.“_

_His fingers glided over her chin and wrapped around the back of her neck. He pulled her closer, but before he could taste her, something disrupted the dream; a loud bang, a shattering thump that took away the classroom, the curious girl and the bittersweet fantasy. Veigar called out and grasped at the swallowing dark, but there was no point. The waking world was calling._

  
  


Veigar reached out to smack and silence the source of the beeping sound rousing him from his sleep. When it happily screeched on, he squinted into the room around him, realizing that it was in fact not his alarm yelling at him as he had assumed, but another device; a tablet in the hands of Fizz, who was for some reason standing in the doorway and frantically tapping the pad screen.

„Fizz?“ Veigar growled, pushing himself on on his elbows.

„Uuuh,“ Fizz mumbled, entirely focused on the game he was playing on his stupid gadget, „yeah?“

„What are you doing here?“

The beeping became more intense, and the tablet flashed red. Fizz groaned. „What?“

„What the _fuck_ are you doing in my room?“

„Oh, uh,“ the scaly yordle stowed his toy, „boss sent me to get you.“

„Right.“ Veigar watched Fizz lazily turn around and head back into the corridor. „And Fizz?“

„Ye?“

„You're mighty brave, annoying the shit out of somebody who knows how to change the oxygen in your tank for carbon monoxide.“

The little fish man sneered. „I'm gonna guess that's a bad thing.“

„Not for me. I'd benefit greatly from your death.“ Veigar's eyes wandered the cell-like chamber in search of some clothes. Fizz waved his finned hand, laughed and left; the threat clearly meant nothing to him, and Veigar suppressed the desire to carry it out just to show him that he _wasn't joking._ Alas, killing another member of the Omega Squad was counterproductive - at least now - and so he let go of it. Besides, he was curious as to why Rumble called _specifically_ for him...

  
  


They were all gathered in Rumble's little 'throne room', a repurposed storage hall in which the Badlands Baron accepted guests and contractors and where he shared late breakfasts with his hired mercenaries. When Veigar arrived, five people were gathered there; Teemo, Fizz and Tristana sat around the corner of a long iron table, stuffing themselves with eggs and toast; Rumble lounged on his scrap throne and eyed a strange box that was just handed to him by the single human member of their little gathering. Veigar frowned when he realized he knew this woman.

„Extraordinary,“ Rumble breathed an amazed whisper when Veigar reached him and his benefactor, „but are you sure it's _it,_ Ursylla?“

The baroness sneered at Veigar, then looked back at the scrapyard king. „Certainly. It's been in my family's possession since the war.“

„You don't look very Ionian.“

„Ah, but the man who handed it over to my grandfather did.“

„Willingly or not?“

„Such details are best left to history, baron.“

Veigar's eyes darted from one to the other. He coughed, having no idea what was going on - or what was the purpose of the box in Rumble's lap.

„Lady Ursylla,“ he bowed his head, „were you the one who hired the Omega Squad for the Brute Haul job?“

„That is correct,“ Ursylla waved her freakishly long metal arm, „the _Badlands Baron_ will handle your monetary compensation. I only came here to hand over his cut.“

„Why?“ Veigar's curiosity got the best of him; the chem-baroness laughed.

„Politics, my dear,“ she left him guessing, turning on her tall heel. Rumble nodded at her in a silent farewell and watched her leave together with Veigar; the rest of the squad, having heard none of their conversation, did their best to ignore her entirely.

„You're old enough to know when to not ask,“ Rumble noted when Ursylla was out of the hall, undoubtedly headed for whatever brought her to the Badlands. Veigar snorted.

„No, I'm _too old_ for these pretend courtesy games,“ he growled, „what's in the coffer?“

„I'll tell you shortly.“ Rumble turned his bloodshot eyes to the rest of the Omega Squad. „Hey, Teemo! It's almost eleven, shouldn't you be on your way to Silvermere?“

„We're having breakfast,“ Teemo hollered back, „stop bullying us, or we'll unionize!“

„Yeah, yeah,“ Rumble rolled his eyes at the snickering trio, clearly not in the mood for their jokes, „move or I'll cut your pay in half.“

While Teemo, Fizz and Tristana got up with much grumbling, Veigar looked over his shoulder and through the rusty windows. The sky was red and filled with smoke, and a trail of dust was rising behind something or somebody darting off towards the crimson horizon. Veigar could only assume that it was Ursylla on a rover, or perhaps a bike; he pouted and perked his brows, quietly acknowledging the baroness' bravery. He certainly wouldn't travel the Badlands alone.

„Have you ever heard of the _Navori code?“_ Rumble pulled Veigar's attention back into the iron hall. Veigar looked at the departing squad and frowned.

„No. Shouldn't I be going with them?“

„They won't need you for this one. I have another job for you.“ Rumble smiled and pushed himself off his precious scrap, the mysterious case still in his hand. „And I've got some new toys for you to try.“

„Great,“ Veigar fumed, running in his steps, „could you perhaps finally explain this whole show to me? What is the Navori code? Where are we going?“

„To kill some zombies,“ Rumble flashed his fangs in a wide grin, „we need to charge this to see what it actually says. Go get your coat - I'll get the guns...“

  
  


There were only two forces present in the Badlands, two ultimate truths constantly vying for power between the red mountains: iron and death. One either had enough of the former or they were inevitably made to face the latter. Crossing the desolate land on foot was unsafe, which was perhaps why Piltover deigned to build the Valoran High Railway. The project was foolish, and nobody expected the engineers to ever be able to finish it; Piltover had neither the technology nor the manforce to protect their workers from everything the Badlands had to throw at them. As Veigar walked the red desert next to Rumble's mech, face hidden behind a gas mask and with a pulse cannon in hand, he couldn't stop looking off into the distance and at the unfinished rail tracks; those abandoned construction sites filled him with a strange kind of sorrow, perhaps nostalgia. He tried remembering the days before the Badlands went Bad, a time before wars and oil-guzzling machinery standing in place of magic. He couldn't; all that came to him were hazy fragments of distant memories, waves of desire and guilt.

Iron and death. Rust and disease. A world gone bad; worse to remember why.

„I think I can see Valor's End from here,“ Rumble's voice echoed from the large robot suit he piloted, „where the flag is. See? They don't dare touch it.“

Veigar looked where the massive iron hand pointed and saw a little peak before them, an elevated plateau of ochre rock. A single steel beam rose from the ground, and on it a tattered flag. He recognized the symbol on it instantly; it was burned into his mind almost as well as it was into his flesh. The New Valoran Republic.

„So this is where it happened,“ Veigar felt a chill run down his spine, „this is—...“

He wasn't able to finish the sentence, and so Rumble continued: „Where the _Pentakill_ was launched, yeah.“

„The grave of the old world. The end of all magic.“

They kept walking, and Veigar felt something he hadn't in a very long time: absolute, overwhelming dread. Stepping on the mesa almost brought tears into his eyes; he had to force them shut and clutch the gun in his hands to remind himself that the past was the past.

„Why did we have to come here? Why couldn't we charge this thing of yours elsewhere?“

„Because they'll come to this place,“ Rumble took a stand on the tallest rock and set his mysterious box down, now complete with a generator and a force coil. Veigar squinted and slid his goggles on, immediately confirming Rumble's words; the ground was covered in magic residuum, unusable blips of energy left behind by those who didn't take all magic being ripped out of Runeterra so well.

Veigar set the projectile type of his pulse cannon to _blast, maximum power and radius._ He didn't have to care for collateral damage here.

„Good time to tell me what that thing is,“ he lifted the gun and aimed into the wastes, „if I'm going to die out here, I'd like to know what for.“

„You know, I'm surprised that you of all people never heard of the Navori code,“ Rumble mused, tuning the coil and his mech's flamethrower. Veigar frowned.

„What's that even supposed to mean?“

„The Navori code is a sequence of symbols - maybe letters, maybe numbers - that opens a vault in Ionia,“ Rumble continued, dismissing his question, „Xan 51. It's rumored to hold the last spark of magic.“

Veigar watched as the first _zombie_ reared its ugly head. He wasn't sure if that thing used to be a human, a deer or perhaps some melted mix of the two, and he was none the wiser when he blasted it with his pulse gun, bits of skin and gore staining the red mesa.

He wondered why they called them zombies. Perhaps pretending those things were no longer alive made it all simpler, more bearable for one's conscience. That they were some sort of undead monstrosities, and not unlucky people and animals that couldn't bear living in a world without magic. It was easier not to think that it could've been anybody.

„Absolute bullshit,“ Veigar finally said, „it's gone. All of it. Trust me, I spent a lot of time looking for it. I found nothing.“

„Maybe it was hiding from you. I wouldn't be surprised.“

Sirens started blaring somewhere in the distance, and Veigar could only guess that the sound came from Rumble's scrap citadel; his bots were announcing the last 'good' hour of the day, before the Badlands turned into an infested hellscape. Veigar wondered if he and Rumble had perhaps lost their minds when they decided to be at Valor's End past nightfall; there weren't a great many places in the world more dangerous than this former battlefield, this memorial to the last Rune War.

He decided not to think about it too much. Instead he let his cannon chuck another pulse wave at a monstrosity that was just digging its way to the surface.

„I get the feeling you know things nobody should,“ Veigar growled into his respirator, „things about me.“

„Maybe.“ The land around them went up in flames as Rumble surrounded them with a ring of fire. „But you're clever enough to tell that I didn't get you the Omega Squad job just because I was feeling _sorry_ for you.“

„What do you expect me to do?“ Veigar growled, listening in to the distant screeches of things they were soon to face; they were coming for them. „To build you another _Pentakill?_ It's not possible. Not anymore.“

„So it's true.“ Another pillar of flame lit up the sky. „You made it. You were one of the _Grand Destroyers.“_

Shadows began appearing in the wastes. They were small at first, dark speckles hiding within ravines and behind the towering hoodoos; as they grew in numbers, they became a single black mass with a thousand hungry eyes. A salve of rockets flew above Veigar's head and into the ravenous horde, but the scorched bodies were soon devoured and replaced by more zombies. They were closing in around the two yordles, too brave for their own good.

„Tell me what happened,“ Rumble released another barrage from his mech's arm; the coil behind him crackled as it absorbed the dying souls and crunched them down for whatever magic was left in them.

„Why?“

„Because somebody has to know what happened back then.“

Veigar pursed his lips. A pulse blasted from his rifle, through the flame wall and into the slobbering horde. It was like a fireball, incinerating everything it came it contact with; it reminded him of magic, of how wonderful and destructive it was. He missed it, with every fiber of his being.

„It all started with a friend,“ he whispered into the fire and explosions, „and a big, bad idea..."

 

 


End file.
